Participants’ Experiences of Sex Offender Treatment: Searching for Desisting Narrative Identities

Abstract

Life-course criminology has demonstrated the importance of social relationships and life transitions to understand desistance. Yet, individuals convicted of sexual offenses seem to differ in terms of turning points, where treatment is suggested as salient to their desistance processes. Drawing on 13 teller-focused interviews with adult male incarcerated participants in a new Swedish sex offender program, this paper examines the treatment experience and the under-explored aspect of early desistance, as well as the role of society and social relations in the treatment process, through a practice-oriented lens. The thematic analysis suggests participants started developing desisting narrative identities where micro turning points in treatment contributed to offenses being explained and re-integrated into a sense of the self as an acceptable person. The process, which also enabled active responsibility, seemed to be facilitated by a holistic, person-centered treatment environment. Nonetheless, continued desistance requires adequate attention to social support and stigma management post-release.